


Like Dandelions

by the_wretching



Category: The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (TV)
Genre: Community: mfu_scrapbook, Community: mfu_slash, M/M, Man From Uncle
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-18
Updated: 2017-03-18
Packaged: 2018-10-07 09:17:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,007
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10357149
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_wretching/pseuds/the_wretching
Summary: A wounded Illya remembers little yellow deaths as he climbs to safety





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [spikesgirl58](https://archiveofourown.org/users/spikesgirl58/gifts).



Illya smelled pine needles. The blond was threading his way up a steep wooded hill piecing together how he had escaped the THRUSH compound below, and alert for any footfalls behind him. He thought he heard a distant _skreek-clack_ from far above but that was surely not a threat commensurate with any sound that might issue from behind. He'd clipped his homing beacon to a tear in his sleeve, right along a seam, and it propelled his climb. 

His side was thrumming. Each step on the left leg shot jagged warnings up into his neck and back down again. He could tell it was bad. But it was the kind of bad for which stopping only makes further movement impossible. He had to at least crest this hill; He felt exposed. It was warm for late spring. The sun had been pitiless. Now clouds, he thought, were diffusing that light, leaving him even more conspicuous than the aggressive yellow glare of sunlight had. There wasn't enough cover. 

Illya had been remembering the first time he'd made love to a girl. In the yard behind his babushka's house with his friend Zlata who'd come to help him clean it out. He had been warned that boys didn't last long their first time. That a young man has to train himself to delay ejaculation. But Illya hadn't had that problem. He'd been too wracked with nerves. It had felt unexpectedly vulnerable being naked with, and touched by, another person. That anxiety tempered the equally unprecedented pleasure. He had felt self-conscious and had feared he would hurt her. He'd been so anxious that he might have failed to satisfy either of them. But when she arched her head up off the grass to bite his neck, thus tightening her nether grip, the most delicious warmth enveloped his whole body. Illya's consciousness released into the ecstasy of that dual sensation, and as he came he smelled cherries. And pine needles. He smelled the foreign earthy smell of his friend's body. And he saw yellow. Like dandelions. Like June. The wash of color had flooded his field of vision with a milky brightness and then ebbed away again as the orgasm faded. _La petite mort_ , that surrender. And if that was the _petite_ version, why fear to hasten to the _grande_?

The yellow was a memory Illya hadn't known he'd possessed until it happened again. He finally took Napoleon for the first time, on their last mission on the floor of their hotel room. They were already sitting on the floor, the better to pore over a spread of maps and dossiers. Illya was on hands and knees to reach for a folder that had shifted off to the edge of the space. Napoleon was leaning his arms on splayed knees, pen in hand, tie long since removed, and hair long since ruffled by frustrated finger-combing. His figure was one of fatigue but his eyes sparkled as conspiratorially as ever. They sauntered over Illya's body and settled impishly on the blond stubble of the Russian's face. As Napoleon had never made a move on him, Illya hadn't been able to work out whether Napoleon's flirtation was merely habitual, or was perhaps some American sort of ribbing. Yet it always felt more confidential than that. This time, Illya didn't hypothesize. He shifted direction and pounced. Napoleon met the ambush with surprising counterbalance only gradually yielding down onto elbows. When Illya came he smelled pine needles. And cherries. And he saw yellow. Like dandelions. In the morning he'd woken in his usual separate bed, the haze of sleep having not blurred, in the slightest, the veracity of what had transpired. 

The terrain was rough with dry rain-forged ruts, rocks, and roots, and the clouds up above the tree tops, he thought, were banking up heavier now. Illya heard a distant rumble and he felt the spectre, on his goosed flesh, of phantom hail. His left side galled him. He thought he might be losing sensation in his leg. He could tend to the. Later. He had to get to. He had to follow the homing beacon and he had to get to the top of this hill and, now he realized, he might also be wanting for a storm shelter. 

Any physical awkwardness had been exorcised long ago through rigorous military and UNCLE training. Illya knew his body now, and everyone else's, instinctually. Like pine needles. It was automatic. Tactical. He had lost any memory of feeling discomfort in his own skin. But Napoleon had made him see yellow. Like dandelions. Napoleon revealed a virgin obstruction to surmount. A newer, bigger, and previously unforeseen _petite mort_ to suffer. 

Illya was too tired now to carry through the thought and he'd reached the summit. The uneven dirt underfoot had given way to green grass. Tended grass at that, though not so tended that it was not thoroughly overtaken by dandelions. He thought the sky was darker still than when last he'd noticed. Illya stopped to catch his breath. To consult his beacon. He put his hand to his left side and it came back sticky. He thought of semen, then pine sap. But his fingers dripped maroon. This was puzzling, and the puzzling brought on a wave of vertigo, so he lowered himself to the ground to rest. 

He could smell dandelion milk. And pine needles. Something mineral like sex, and a faint echo of cherries. 

When he opened his eyes he noticed the house. A small, weather-beaten, yellow house, vivid against the dark sky. Near enough he might make it there if he could feel his limbs enough to stand. The house, he realized now, looked just like his babushka's house. No -- not “just like.” He recognized the wear pattern on the paint. He knew that _skreek-clack_ of the screen door opening and bouncing closed again. And there, against the swirling charcoal sky, _was_ his babushka, in cherry-stained apron, crossing the yellow lawn to collect him up and carry him out of the storm.

 

**Author's Note:**

> For the 2017 Spring Fling LJ MfU Scrapbook Challenge. In response to Spikesgirl58's photo prompt. (Included) 
> 
> Thanks to my Russian DW friend for answering questions about 1940s-50s Russia, and for suggesting the name Zlata, which means "golden." 
> 
> I regret that this piece doesn't feel in-keeping with "Spring Fling" but the photo pulled the vignette out of me in all its darkness and love. This little story is entirely the result of feelings this lovely photo evoked and compelled.


End file.
